Founded in 1883 the Imperial Institute was created to promote the development and industrial use of the raw materials of the overseas territories. It had a Commercial Intelligence Dept and a Scientific and Practical Research Dept. In 1903 the Institute was transferred to the Board of Trade whose Commercial Intelligence Branch took over the statistical functions. In 1916 the Institute was again transferred to the Colonial Office who set up a series of Technical Advisory Committees, one of which was the Mineral Resources Committee. In 1919 the government established a separate Imperial Mineral Resources Bureau which operated alongside the Imperial Institute until in 1926 the two services amalgamated under the Dept of Overseas Trade. The Imperial Institute became the Commonwealth Institute in 1957 with the emphasis being on education rather than research. The geological surveying functions were taken over by the Colonial/Overseas Geological Surveys.

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